


Fluffy Flour

by Mimisempai



Series: It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas [3]
Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Christmas Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff and Humor, Humor, Inspired by a true story (mine), M/M, a lot of flour and fluff, baking gingerbread, baking together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-13
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:22:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28056825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mimisempai/pseuds/Mimisempai
Summary: Sometimes neither is better than the other, so you just have to learn together... even when it comes to gingerbread.
Relationships: Rafael Barba/Dominick "Sonny" Carisi Jr.
Series: It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2052099
Comments: 7
Kudos: 23





	Fluffy Flour

"How many eggs did you say?" asked Rafael as he opened a carton of eggs.

"Three, I think," Sonny replied, looking up from the bowl of brown sugar and butter that he had tried to "cream" together - without knowing what the word meant exactly - with moderate success. In the end, making a homogenous mixture was not so easy, when the butter was cold to begin with, and despite his hard work to crush and spread it with a spatula and a lot of elbow grease, he still had only a grainy beige dough, which didn't seem "creamy" at all. He looked at the recipe he had borrowed from his mother and found the place where it said "eggs". Oops. "Oh, there are only two, actually."

"Sonnyyyy! You're kidding!"

Rafael sighed dramatically and Sonny turned to see him press his lips together, holding half an egg shell in each of his hands. There were two more shells on the counter next to him. 

"Can you... take one of them out?" 

"Maybe I can." Rafael tried valiantly to remove the slippery and now useless egg from the bowl, but he only managed to break one of the yolks. He put down the bowl and the spoon he had used to fish the egg and looked at Sonny, who had been watching him the whole time. He said, "No."

"That's okay," Sonny said in a helpful tone. "Just start over again!"

Rafael threw him an eggshell - which missed Sonny’s head - and took two eggs from the box. 

Sonny returned to his sugar-butter mixture, which was beginning to soften slightly. 

Once the butter and sugar were as soft as Sonny could get, he added molasses and stirred until it was a nice, separate mixture of tarry molasses and pieces of butter and sugar dough. Hmm. 

"Maybe," Rafael stopped to sniff a bottle of vanilla extract before adding a spoonful to his two eggs and whipping vigorously. "Maybe an electric mixer would be a good idea."

"Not in this house, my boy! These devil's machines have no business in making gingerbread! Don’t you dare!" Sonny imitated his mother's tone as he made his way to the cupboard where he kept his mixer. He heard Rafael's light snicker behind his back.

Rafael slowly poured the eggs and vanilla into the bowl, and Sonny turned the mixer, initially at low speed, then faster as he became impatient. He stopped from time to time to scrape the sides of the bowl with his spatula and to take a few looks at Rafael, who looked positively domestic with his uncombed hair (for once), a growing beard (if only he wouldn’t shave it off) and an apron around his waist (if only he wasn't wearing anything underneath). Sonny smiled at himself. It was cute, but he wouldn't say it out loud. 

"What makes you smile like that?" Rafael had to sneak peeks at him, because Sonny thought he had been rather discreet. 

"Nothing," Sonny shrugged his shoulders, stirring the dough one last time before putting the spatula aside. "Just because you're next to me."

"Charming." Rafael said it as a mockery, but Sonny could tell by the sudden blushing of his ears that he was satisfied. A point for Sonny. 

"Okay, what next?" Sonny looked at the recipe sheet again. "The dry ingredients. Do you want to measure the flour or the spices?"

Instead of answering, Rafael took the jar of cinnamon and a measuring spoon and waited for Sonny to open the bag of flour. 

Six cups of flour and several tablespoons of various spices later, they realized they needed a larger bowl. 

Once this was done, and everything mixed, it was time to add it to the bowl of molasses, butter, eggs ... wet and brown. 

Rafael poured some of the dry mixture into the bowl, and Sonny started the mixer. 

Nothing in the kitchen was spared by the flour flying everywhere, even the inside of drawers and closed cupboards. And of course, Rafael and Sonny, being closest to the bowl, received the most of it. 

Sonny turned to Rafael after a while, slightly horrified to see his face, his shirt and his hair covered with white powder. Rafael looked just as shocked. Before Sonny could speak, with an excuse on the tip of his tongue, Rafael threw his head back and started laughing, shaking flour from his shoulders and onto the floor. Sonny joined him. 

"I'm sorry, Rafael," he said, catching his breath between laughs. "I didn't mean to do that."

"I hope so," Rafael replied, arching a whitened eyebrow. He picked up a towel and started wiping Sonny's chin. 

"I should have listened to my mother." Sonny closed his eyes, letting Rafael tilt his face back and forth as he brushed the flour from his cheeks and forehead before rubbing the cloth over his own face. 

"Noted," mumbled Rafael through the towel. His shoulders were still trembling with a silent laughter as he ran his hand through his hair to get as much flour out as possible. 

Sonny came over to help him, running his fingers through his usually soft hair, which was all rough with flour, until it returned to its natural brown color. 

Once they and the kitchen were clean enough to continue, they hand-mixed the rest of the flour with the wet ingredients until a firm, very crumbly dough was formed. 

"I don't think this is right." 

The recipe said that the dough should be soft and sticky. It was too dry, too crumbly to be separated into two halves as required. Sonny put his hands on his hips and stared at it. Rafael hummed thoughtfully and quickly rubbed Sonny's back. 

"If you keep working on it, it might get better." 

Sonny threw the contents of the bowl on the counter and continued working on it with his hands while Rafael picked up the dirty dishes and rinsed them in the sink. 

"No, it's still not coming together," Sonny said as Rafael dried his hands on a lightly floured towel. 

Rafael walked to the refrigerator and pulled out a carton of milk. He poured a little bit of it into the dough, and while Sonny was kneading it, it softened and became manageable. Sonny pushed his shoulder against Rafael's as a sign of gratitude. 

"Thank you, thank you." He smiled at Rafael, whose eyes were very soft as they turned towards him. 

Sonny formed the dough into two discs, wrapped them and gave them to Rafael, who put them in the fridge to keep them cool for a few hours. 

"And now?" asked Rafael, looking at the recipe. 

Sonny turned to him. 

"There's this movie I wanted to see," he said, getting closer to Rafael, "If only I had someone to watch it with..."

Rafael got closer too. He smiled with a hint of mischief. 

"I'm sure it can be arranged." 

__________

Three hours and a movie spent cuddling on the couch later, the dough was probably cold enough to work with. 

Sonny and Rafael each took out one half, jostling each other's elbows and throwing flour at each other while working side by side. By the time they rolled out the dough as thin as the recipe called for, they had covered much of the counter.

"How many cookies does that make anyway?" Sonny looked at the recipe, but it didn't say anything. Obviously, enough for an army. Which was just as well, since they had enough friends to hand them out to. 

"I guess it depends on the size of the cookies you make." 

And then there was nothing else to do but cut the cookies and put them on baking sheets. Sonny made a batch of gingerbread cookies, as well as several stars, hearts and candy canes. They placed their cookies on baking sheets and put them in the hot oven. 

"SIRI, set a timer for... ten minutes." 

"Timer set for ten minutes," answered the phone in his robotic voice. 

While the cookies were baking, they measured the powdered sugar, milk and more vanilla for icing until they had a smooth mixture with what was hopefully the right texture. Ten minutes later, the cookies were ready to be placed on the cooling racks. Sonny, however, couldn't resist the urge to try one still warm and bit the head off. Rafael bent down to eat, and Sonny broke off a piece and put it in his mouth. They chewed thoughtfully for a while. 

"Hmm. I'm not sure I'm the biggest gingerbread fan, to tell you the truth," Sonny said. It wasn't bad, anyway, but he preferred the slightly less spicy cookies. Rafael took the cookie from his hands and continued to eat it, apparently he was a fan. 

They divided the frosting into small bowls and added dye to some of them - red and green, of course, and a little gold for the stars Sonny had made. They also had an assortment of sprinkles in different sizes and shapes, and they started working with the icing when the cookies were cool. It was a longer - and stickier - process than Sonny had anticipated, but Rafael's warm presence and his occasional, unattended laughter as he sprinkled sugar on the stars or added stripes to the canes was worth every second. 

But finally, Sonny put one last smile and one last button on one of the gingerbread men. 

Rafael looked over his shoulder. 

"You missed a spot," he said, and Sonny looked at him first, then at the cookie. 

"Really? 

"Mhmm." Rafael nodded and Sonny felt it, he was so close. 

"I... can't see anything. Where?"

"You've got some frosting on your right..." He leaned even closer, but Sonny couldn't see where he was pointing "-here". And suddenly there was a warm mouth on his cheek, licking the traces of frosting there. "And there's a little bit here." Rafael put his mouth over Sonny's jaw and wrapped his arms around his waist. "And there's even more right here." He kissed the back of Sonny's neck. 

Sonny turned to face him, and brought his own arms up to Rafael's shoulders. He raised an eyebrow to his husband. 

"I'm sure I don't have any frosting in this place." 

"Oh, but there is," Rafael said very seriously. "And there's even more here." He kissed Sonny right behind his ear, Sonny's breath quickened and he instinctively brought Rafael closer. "And you even..." Rafael slipped a finger coated with frosting on Sonny's lips. "-Just there," he whispered. He watched Sonny carefully, until Sonny felt the warmth rising on his face. 

He leaned over and gave Rafael a really sweet kiss, with a taste of icing and warm spices and new memories of living together that piled up in his head.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Sarah for the beta as always !


End file.
